Inventory and Purchasing Management

The Task Force recommends a

systematic change in the way the
District handles inventory
operations.
Bill Hallmark
Chair,
Inventory and Purchasing
Management Task Force
and Associate, William M.
Mercer, Inc.

At the heart of the Inventory and

Purchasing Management Task
Forces work was reviewing
KPMGs belief that: (1) the District
maintains excessive inventory; (2) up
to 50% of this inventory could be
reduced; and (3) reducing the inventory would bring significant savings
to the District. The Task Force and
AISC agrees that the District maintains too much inventory. However,
the Task Force also believes that the
amount of KPMGs inventory reduction recommendation is arbitrary and
the cost savings are baseless.
Reducing inventory will not achieve
anywhere near the savings KPMG
projected.
As an alternative, the Task Force is
recommending a systemic change to
the way the District handles inventory operations. Currently, there is no
cost associated with storing items
over long periods of timewarehousing is perceived as free. The
Task Force believes that the true
costs of warehouse operations should
be added to all current and future
items and be borne by the user.
The Task Force also recommends
revisions to the credit (return) policy
that will similarly capture the true
costs. Two options were developed
for the District to consider adopting:
(1) Charge a restocking fee (e.g.,
10% of the item value for restocking), which is on par with the private
sector for cost recovery and a penalty to discourage over-buying; or (2)
build return costs into the front-end
price, like a retail store.
The Task Force and AISC strongly
support the implementation of a new
inventory management information
system. Based on the Task Forces
experience alone, it is very difficult

to extract the right information to

assess inventory demand or other
aspects of inventory management.
However, the Task Force has spent
time with Warehouse, Purchasing,
and Information Systems staff and
believes that the data flow can be
improved even with the existing,
inadequate system.

Inventory Reduction
Recommendations 87 VI-13.1, 88
VI-13.2, 89 VI-13.3
These recommendations cover the
primary ways KPMG felt the District
could address its excessive inventory: reducing inventory by 25-50%;
implementing just-in-time delivery;
and reconsidering adding warehouse
space in a new parking facility. The
Task Force found that dead stock
(stock not used over a long period)
and non-essential inventory can and
should be eliminated, especially in
the maintenance area. However,
nothing in the findings or in the Task
Force review indicates that either a
25% or 50% reduction of all warehouse inventory is possible or desirable. In addition, KPMG appears to
have equated a reduction in inventory to a reduction in costs. This is not
true when dealing with dead stock
that is not regularly purchased. The
dead stock does not have labor costs.
The assertion that less inventory
equals less staff is also false. In fact,
moving the inventory more often
may require the same or higher
staffing levels.
Rather than arbitrarily reducing the
inventory by 50%, the District needs
to address the systemic causes of
excess inventory. One clear cause is
that the warehouse is viewed as
free by those who use it. This view
distorts cost comparisons against
outside vendors and other alterna-

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The District should consider charging departments the full cost of warehouse services.
Ed Sheets
Inventory Management and
Purchasing Task Force, AISC
and President, Ed Sheets
Consulting

The District should look at both the

restocking concept and the retail concept and determine which operations
will result in the greatest incentive to
save money.
Suzanne Flynn
Inventory Management and
Purchasing Task Force and
Auditor, Multnomah County

tives in favor of using the warehouse. In some areas, this distortion

has led to what may be described as
a just-in-case inventory system.
The alternative recommendation
views the warehouse as a centralized
service that other departments use on
a full-cost basis. Managers will then
have the necessary information to
make the most cost-effective use of
the warehouse for the District. Used
properly, the warehouse provides
some advantages over private alternatives including being exempt from
inventory taxes. Existing hard copy
material planning information reports
should be made available electronically to allow for better information
analysis and management.
The Task Force also believes that
improvements can be made in leadtime. Better information systems
could help shorten the lead-time for
delivery and provide monthly usage
reports to track demand. However,
KPMG made no cost impact estimates for this recommendation. Justin-time delivery could increase both
purchasing and delivery costs, as
there would be smaller orders placed
and more deliveries to schools-even
with phased delivery. With $5 million in current inventory, a 10%
increase in costs ($500,000) would
wipe out even the most optimistic
staff savings projected by KPMG.
The Task Force agrees with KPMG
that additional storage space does not
appear to be warranted at this time.
However, should BESC, Madison
High School, or Marshall High
School be closed per some of the
other recommendations, additional
storage might be required.

Credit (Return)
Policy
Recommendation 90 VI-14.1
The Task Force and the AISC found
that while the District has a written
credit policy, it should be strengthened to accurately cover the costs,
and clearly capture all existing return
practices. The Task Force disagreed
with the way KPMG calculated the
cost to return items, both in the percentage (41% of the inventory value)
and the amount of inventory returned
(a three-year average).
The Task Force discussed both a
restocking charge concept and a
retail concept where the cost is built
into the price. The positive aspect of
the restocking charge is that it discourages over-buying and is in-line
with other Task Force recommendations. The positive aspect of the
retail model is that there is less processing, thus avoiding spending more
in staff time than a restocking charge
provides for small purchases. The
Task Force believes the District
should look at both options and
select one based on net cost criteria
and incentives to save money.

Off-site Storage
Recommendation 91 VI-15.1
The Task Force did not find the
KPMG arguments of lack of access
to be compelling. Nor did the Task
Force think the spaces could be converted easily for use by people.
However, the Task Force recognized
that any building use has to fit within
an overall asset management plan.
The space at Marshall is appropriate
for long-term storage, as it is more
difficult to access. The Madison
storeroom is appropriate for shorterterm storage, as it is easier to get in

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and out of the area. However, as with
Marshall, this area is not currently
suitable for people. Remodeling or
structural changes of unknown cost
would be needed to make these areas
suitable for use as class or activity
space occupied by students.

Benchmarking should be applied to

the entire materials management
system.
Michael Hutchens
Inventory Management and
Purchasing Task Force, AISC
and Director of Purchasing,
Risk Manager, Portland Public
Schools

What is currently stored in these two

areas is largely furniture, both new
and used. In addition, about a third
of the space at Madison is used for
storing obsolete or surplus material,
prior to being sold by the State (the
proceeds of which partially return to
the District). Just over a third of the
space at Marshall is vacant and
serves as a back-up, temporary storage area in instances where large
amounts of furniture come in from a
school.
The Task Force believes that space at
BESC is more valuable and might be
better used as a lease-for-cash
option.
Therefore, use of Marshall and
Madison for warehouse needs should
be coordinated with the District-wide
asset management plan. The District
should provide greater oversight of
obsolete materials prior to storage,
and warehousing charges in
Recommendation 88 should apply to
any user seeking storage. Marshall
should be used for long-term overflow storage in recognition of the
difficulty getting in and out of the
space with the resulting high cost of
moving items to and from the site.
Short-term storage should be restricted to BESC or Madison. Overall cost
savings, potential income from rental
of BESC storage space, and the cost
of renovation for human use, should
be considered in decisions regarding
use of Madison and Marshall for
storage.

Purchasing Staff
Efficiency
Recommendation 92 VI-16.1
The Task Force did not find the
KPMG benchmarking method based
on the number of purchase orders to
be a compelling method for measuring efficiency, and so disagreed with
the finding that the staff could be
more efficient.
However, the Task Force agrees that
benchmarking performance is a good
thing to do and that efficiency is
important. The Task Force also
believes that this benchmarking
should be applied to the entire materials management system, and not
simply be applied to purchasing
staff.
The Task Force looked at other ways
to measure performance. The Task
Force initially chose to use one quick
benchmark that was simple to calculate with existing data: the dollar
value of requisitions per purchasing
staff person. Dollar value of requisitions was measured roughly by total
expenditures less personnel costs and
bond/other debt service. Purchasing
staff was defined as central materials management staff plus staff with
purchasing responsibility. These definitions were chosen to allow rapid
comparison across the districts
KPMG used for number of purchase
orders.
Michael Hutchens applied that formula to the past 3 years purchases,
with the following results: efficiency
rose 0.6%, 8.5%, and 15.6% respectively in the last three years. He also
called three other benchmark districts and found that he could not get
comparable data do to variations in
reported information and differences

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in definitions. Mr. Hutchens is continuing to try to obtain information
from which valid comparisons can
be made.
For longer-term evaluation, however,
this measure has at least two drawbacks: it encourages spending, to
build up dollars per employee, and
falsely shows lower prices as lower
efficiency.
The team then briefly reviewed several other measures used by municipalities, provided by Task Force
member Suzanne Flynn. Although
the limited time frame and scope of
the review did not permit the Task
Force to recommend or implement
any specific measures, the group
feels that a combination of measures
would be most effective, particularly
measures that showed speed of processing and adequate numbers of
qualified bidders to ensure truly
competitive bidding. The Purchasing
Department now has that list of measures to use in planning. The Task
Force also believes that procurement
procedures should be updated district-wide to reduce barriers to efficient operations and prepare the staff
for business procedures based on the
new Information system.

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